After a year of scandal by the contract for the management of the traffic light network of Greater Santo Domingo, the National Institute of Land Transit (Intrant) notified the company Transcore Latam SRL the rescission of the contractual relationship they reached in June 2023.
Through a act of sheriff, the Intrantwhich is now run by Milton Morrisonnotified the company and its manager Pedro Padovani last Tuesday, September 17, about the start of the procedure administrative termination of contract and gave him a period of three days, which ends this Fridayto present their means of defense.
He contract for 1,317 million pesos had been suspended by the General Directorate of Public Procurement (DGCP) since October 27 due to serious irregularities in the process of hiringon November 21 of that year, annulled the process of tender in which she was hired Transcore Latam and on December 4, he was permanently disqualified from the State Supplier Registry.
Despite these decisions, the contract with Transcore Latam was still in force, urging its rescission by the Intrantafter the blackout traffic light on August 28, 29 and 30, 2024, classified by the transit entity as a “sabotage” orchestrated by the company.
Cancellation under due process
To terminate the contract, Intrant should honor the commitments of payments acquired with Transcore Latamwhich according to statements made by its manager last year and by the former director of the IntrantHugo Beras, the project had been executed at 65%.
He procedure that will start the Intrant To cancel it definitively, it must be tied to the due process stipulated in the procedure of settlement of the hiring issued by the DGCP.
According to this procedure“the settlement of the contract It consists of the exact determination of the execution contractual, compliance with obligations and commitments pending or unexecuted.”
In its recitals, the Intrant explains that “when a situation occurs court decision either administrative ordering the termination of the contractthe contracting institution must verify the procedure suitable for compliance with the decision of the governing body… It must be determined whether the decision is enforceable and is not affected by suspension, either by a particular decision or by compliance with the legally established deadlines. Once the enforceability of the decision is determined, judicial decisionit administrativethe liquidation procedure must be carried out hiring“.
He continues that “the phase of settlement of the contractthe contracting institution may assess whether it needs to make a new contract to meet its objectives or if there is no need for it.”
In the case of decisions by the General Directorate of Public Procurement – as the governing body – which usually require notification of their compliance, since they generally not only cover the total or partial cancellation of a certain selection process, but also obligations to be fulfilled such as publication on the Transactional Portal. In this sense, when a contract is completed, contract based on a decision of the governing body, the contracting institution must notify this situation and the documents that were issued.”
Why was Transcore Latam cancelled?
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Transcore Latam participated in the Intrant bidding process and was hired on June 19, 2023. The governing body began an investigation in which it confirmed the subject of the complaints against it regarding the falsification of documents and also established other irregularities committed by both the company and the institution. It requested a criminal investigation by the Attorney General’s Office, of which there are no details. It also recommended that the institution sanction those responsible for this bidding for the flaws found in the process.
